


When the Storm Ends

by sillygirlwithaflower



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-14
Updated: 2014-07-14
Packaged: 2018-02-08 18:32:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1951740
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sillygirlwithaflower/pseuds/sillygirlwithaflower
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Danarius comes to reclaim his lost property, Hawke and Fenris end up locked in a battle to the death. </p><p>Retelling of "Alone."</p>
            </blockquote>





	When the Storm Ends

**Author's Note:**

> This is a retelling of "Alone" going off of ideas that were presented during a previous conversation with Fenris about the fog warriors. First time writing in this fandom and for this pairing. Be gentle.

 

 

_"When Danarius came they refused to let him take me. He ordered me to kill them. So I did. I killed them all." - Fenris, "Questioning Beliefs", Act II_ \- ~ - ~ -

It was astounding, really, how the world could narrow to a moment in time, a scant heartbeat. Moments passed and she was forced to absorb that Fenris truly had a sister, that she was here, sitting at one of the old warped wooden tables at the Hanged Man. Seconds later, a voice that meant little to Hawke cut through the clamor of the common room. She knew that something terrible was happening, but she was too slow to comprehension. By the time her mind wrapped around the haughty older man descending the stairs into the common room as a threat, Fenris had marked the man, identified him, and responded by drawing his broadsword. The marks that lined his body were already glowing.

Hawke grabbed her own staff from her back, trying to prepare herself for this. Danarius. The man couldn't be anyone else. Fenris was angry, but ti went so much deeper than simple rage. She remembered what had happened when Danarius' apprentice had come before them. Hawke still remembered the sound of a woman's heart being crushed in her own chest, and the look on Fenris' face when he'd turned away from the carnage he'd caused. He'd killed Hadriana because he could not allow her to live, but it hadn't brought him any peace. Not really.

Determined to spare him the same pain, or perhaps worse, she looked up at Danarius but the man wasn't paying any attention to _her_. The way those cold, dark eyes traced their way over Fenris's body, taking in where lyrium lines disappeared beneath leather jerkin and appeared again on deceptively narrow ankles. The look filled Hawke with disgust and anger and pure protective indignation, the likes of which she'd never felt before in her life.

Fenris was angry. Beyond angry. Hawke had never seen this in him before. But beneath that anger was something she wasn't sure she'd ever seen in him before. Fear. Fenris was afraid of Danarius, and the spoke more volumes of his life as a slave than anything he might admit over several bottles of good red Tevinter wine.

Danarius finally looked at her, and she matched him, look for look. "Is this your new mistress, Fenris? The Champion of Kirkwall... how lovely." Hawke felt a cold, slimy feeling crawl up her spine. She fought the urge to shudder, but she refused to be the first to look away. She wouldn't show that much weakness to this filth masquerading as a man. Danarius finally looked back to Fenris.

"My dear pet... kill her, and we can return to Tevinter." His tone was condescending and felt like sandpaper being dragged over her skin.

Still, Hawke barked a laugh. She could be nothing but confident of her victory; the attitude of the Champion in Varric's stories was closer to the truth of her than most of the rest he wrote. "Fat chance of that. Fenris isn't your plaything anymore." Her typical cocky voice filled the room with her confidence, like music. The patrons that remained in the room were the type too intrigued to go just yet, though there would likely be a fight. She heard the clink of coins and low key voices; were people betting on the outcome of this fight? That would be typical of the Hanged Man.

Fenris looked at her, eye to eye. His rage was ebbing, and a deep shame replaced it in Fenris's face. He took in both of them, mages standing toe to toe, and something in his expression made her blood run chilly. Her throat clenched.

 _"I killed them all."_ his voice, a memory from years before, echoed in her head. The fog warriors, the rebels that had fought for him and his freedom, and he'd turned on them simply because Danarius had asked it.

"No, Fenris... this isn't the end. This isn't inevitable. He cannot get you back." she breathed, but she barely had time to grab the staff from her back and raise it above her head. He bore down on her with strength augmented by the lyrium that lined his dark skin. "Don't do this." she pleaded with him.

"The lad is quite skilled, isn't he?" Danarius laughed from somewhere to her right. Hawke dared not look at him. She couldn't afford to split her attention. From behind her her remaining companions-Aveline and Varric-roused themselves out of a stunned reprieve, but she barked at them.

"No! Don't hurt him!" she ordered them. "Get Dararius and his men." Battle exploded around them as Varric and Aveline engaged with the rest of their enemies.

Fenris locked eyes with her for a moment, and she thought there was hope. Then he disengaged and the fiercest battle for her life she'd ever faced begun.

It was too surreal for words. Facing the Arishok had not been like this. Then she'd fought with a calm confidence, her skill and her magic the greatest strengths she could have asked for entering in a one-on-one combat with a man who was several times her strength and size. Fenris was slighter than Hawke, and they were of a similar height. In a fair fight, they were an odd but about evenly matched pair.

This fight would never be fair.

He had been building a life here. With her. They had not been together for years and years, but she'd seen the subtle ways he'd built friendships and found freedom to his tastes. All of that shattered in one terrible moment? No. She refused to believe it. She wouldn't. She would die before she allowed that fragile life to be destroyed completely.

"Fenris, please." she felt tears well, but knew that to distort her vision would be to die and despite the over-romanticized crap her mind was spewing at her, she didn't want to die today. She gasped for air as she spun to the side to deflect yet another blow. "Let's fight him together. I'm here for you. Always, Fenris. I'm always going to be here for you! Danarius can't take you from me!" she felt foolish, but she couldn't stop babbling. As he moved, she marked the red favor he'd tied around his gauntlet. She'd always taken it as a sign that he would return to her one day. Had she been so wrong to have hope?

No. She refused to believe that. She couldn't give up.

She felt her body grow heavier with each motion, her mind duller. She recognized the effect of magic before she could respond to it. Blood magic, to affect her mind and body in such a way. Sure enough, when she dared to look she saw Danarius standing halfway up the stairs with a dull eyed serving girl in one hand and a knife in the other. Blood spattered the stairs, his robes, and ran freely from the girl's neck.

Pain, fire, ice. What was already a terrible dance, long and dark, became eternity strung out between moments. She was not aware of her body becoming too heavy for her to control, nor her own blood pouring rather dramatically from a gash to her side. She did not see Fenris's carefully blank face shatter, seeing what his sword had done to her. She knew only the pain and the eternity and the hope that she clung to with white knuckled determinedness. Her knees impacted the floor, her body moved like a poorly wired marionette. Even as the blood magic's control receded, and she became aware of the situation with wicked clarity, she still had little in the way of control.

Aveline was at her side in a moment, standing between her and Danarius, even as Fenris stepped back, one hand raised to his head and the other clutching the hilt of his broadsword.

"Hawke." he breathed. Aveline tensed ever further, but Hawke had ordered her not to hurt him. She had no doubts that Aveline would do as she was asked. She was a good friend.

Danarius had no guards left, Hawke realized. Just the man on the stairs, staring down at her with a smug, hate filled expression.

"Fenris, it seems your skills have slacked significantly since you've been gone. We will have to remedy that." His tone was less self assured, but it wasn't that of a beaten man. Hawke took a few steadying breathes before she managed to stand, leaning heavily on her staff.

"Fenris is not a slave!" She bellowed at the top of her lungs. Aveline jerked and glanced at Hawke. Varric appeared at her elbow, eying her warily.

Fenris wouldn't look at her.

Of course Danarius wasn't ready to lay down and die just yet. Aveline gasped when the air around them was suddenly filled with shades. Hawke swore and moved, though it hurt to do so, firing off fire and ice spells left and right.  

 "Spare the Champion, if you can. She will fetch a great price in Tevinter." 

Hawke flushed red at the suggestion that she would ever be anyone's slave. After all she'd heard from Fenris, after she'd seen the deeply rooted conflicts in his own mind with freedom and what he deserved... oh, she would rather die.

Not that she was going to be dying today, either.

The shades gave them little trouble, though by the end of it she felt heavy and her head was swimming. She pressed a hand to her side and realized she was losing blood much faster than she had thought. Her robes were ruined, the entire left hip and most of the fabric beneath it was stained red. And blood was miserably hard to get out of cotton.

"I'm going to have to buy a new robe after this. I'll be sending the bill to your estate, Danarius." She sounded a little punch drunk, she realized, even as all of her companions looked at her.

Even Fenris. When their eyes met once more, she swallowed hard. The shades were gone, but Danarius still lived. That was Fenris' role, she knew. He had to kill Danarius or this would never be over for him. He hadn't fought on either side during that last round.

"Fenris, no matter what happens... you have known freedom here. You are no longer this man's slave. What you do here is your own choice."

The war on his face was brief, bitter, and left a strange resolve in his eyes. Hawke felt her heart turn to ice when he turned and walked up those stairs to stand obediently at Danarius' side. No. NO! Fenris would never have willingly chosen to return to slavery, especially not slavery at Danarius' hand. She bit her lip to keep from screaming at him. This was his choice. She couldn't take it from him, not and reinforce that he was a man free to make his own choices.

She fought her own internal war, to keep her pain off of her face. Varric and Aveline were already exchanging looks. They would try to keep her from this fight, to spare her. They had that in common: a deep and abiding concern for her well being. But she had to be here. Didn't they understand that?

Danarius laughed and reached out a hand to brush strands of white hair out of Fenris' eyes. The motion churned her stomach. She thought she might be ill. "Such a good little wolf." Danarius laughed. Hawke looked away, and in that moment, something happened.

Fenris reached a hand into Danarius' chest and grasped the man's heart. A moment later, he'd crushed it and Danarius' corpse lay in a heap, that he ignored as he descended the stairs. Hawke finally looked at him, her mouth partially open in shock. Aveline tensed, but she didn't attack Fenris when he approached. The elf grabbed Hawke's face from either side and kissed her with all of the pain and fear and hurt they'd both felt this last half hour. She fisted her hands, one clean and one bloody, in his jerkin.

And she never wanted to let him go.

"She needs a healer, Fenris." Aveline finally cut in, her tone disapproving.

Fenris pulled away and in his eyes she saw uncertainty and fear and anger and grief and too many other things to put a name to. She shook her head.

"I'm here for you. Always." She breathed.

"If there is a future to be had, I will face it at your side." he replied. And that was it. That was all they needed to say. Fenris lifted her off of her feet, and though her pride itched to be carried so he cradled her and moved out of the tavern. His sister had fled somewhere in the midst of the fighting. Would they never see her again? Would she resurface? Things had a tendency to resurface after years in this city.

Hawke rested her head against his shoulder as he moved through Lowtown. Varric had gone jogging off to find Anders, but they would take her to Hightown. To her home. Aveline escorted them, looking as official as she could at the stares they received, but she left them alone when they reached the estate. Hawke's servants scattered to find clean bandages and dig up the house's store of potions, but Hawke wasn't really aware of them. When Fenris laid her in her bed, and began to move away, she grasped at his gauntlet, her fingers tangling in the favor he'd tied there. 

He stopped moving, and knelt at the edge of the bed, well within reach of her.

"I am sorry, Hawke." he managed. "I do not deserve your forgiveness."

"Why did you believe him?" It was the only question that mattered. "I would never have let him take you, not while I still breathed."

"I was afraid Danarius would kill you. If I only hurt you, and you told me to go..." he shook his head. "But I could not shake your faith in me, you stubborn mage."

She felt those unshed tears from earlier fill her eyes again. "No. Never." she replied. "I will always believe the best of you. You're a good man, Fenris... though perhaps next time you could try a little less  enthusiastically to save my life." She winced as she shifted.

Concern filled his eyes. "I had not intended to badly hurt you. Danarius' spell slowed your movements or I would have but grazed you."

"Good to know that you didn't want me dead, just maimed." She teased. Hearing her usual good humor returning to her voice, he tried to smile for her, but only managed to not look entirely ill.

"I should have spoken to you about us long before today. I ran away, frightened of what I'd seen, of a past that has no real baring on the life I have built here."

Hawke considered that. "Your past will haunt you until you know what it is. But I would hope that it would not frighten you so much again?"

She wanted...needed... confirmation that he wasn't just going to run away again.

"No. I have found where I belong... at your side. Always."


End file.
